Comments on: The Guardian, Israel and editorial lines http://blog.pigsaw.org/permalink/2005/04/27/23 All the pig that's fit to saw Tue, 06 Jan 2009 07:37:50 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 By: Pashmina http://blog.pigsaw.org/permalink/2005/04/27/23#comment-5 Pashmina Thu, 28 Apr 2005 14:31:25 +0000 http://blog.pigsaw.org/permalink/2005/04/27/23#comment-5 Well obviously you're asking the right question there, and realistically I don't read any of the other dailies often enough to be able to venture an opinion on their relative coverage, objective or not. However I know that the Guardian thing bothers me because it's "my" paper and I want it to be better than it sometimes proves itself to be. A hopeless fancy, I know... Feel terrible about mentioning the typo now. Must learn to control my own pedantry. Well obviously you’re asking the right question there, and realistically I don’t read any of the other dailies often enough to be able to venture an opinion on their relative coverage, objective or not.

However I know that the Guardian thing bothers me because it’s “my” paper and I want it to be better than it sometimes proves itself to be. A hopeless fancy, I know…

Feel terrible about mentioning the typo now. Must learn to control my own pedantry.

]]> By: Nik http://blog.pigsaw.org/permalink/2005/04/27/23#comment-4 Nik Thu, 28 Apr 2005 13:54:31 +0000 http://blog.pigsaw.org/permalink/2005/04/27/23#comment-4 Well, I wouldn't seek to disagree with anything you've said, and I'm sure your references to content which has bothered you are correct. The question I really have is whether it's different in any other paper, and if so then how? And how can you be objective about judging that? I don't know the answer, and I wouldn't demand an answer from you, either. I think people pre-judge the Guardian in a way they don't with other papers (or other media). And that bothers me. Am personally very depressed about the typo, now. Well, I wouldn’t seek to disagree with anything you’ve said, and I’m sure your references to content which has bothered you are correct. The question I really have is whether it’s different in any other paper, and if so then how? And how can you be objective about judging that? I don’t know the answer, and I wouldn’t demand an answer from you, either. I think people pre-judge the Guardian in a way they don’t with other papers (or other media). And that bothers me.

Am personally very depressed about the typo, now.

]]> By: Pashmina http://blog.pigsaw.org/permalink/2005/04/27/23#comment-3 Pashmina Thu, 28 Apr 2005 09:59:27 +0000 http://blog.pigsaw.org/permalink/2005/04/27/23#comment-3 A considered post, and one which deserves a lengthier and better thought-out response than I’m afraid I’m going to be able to give just now. Have skim-read your comparative analysis and am impressed - it’s very illuminating and would be interesting to see the a repeat of the exercise for the same period in 2005. However I suspect that you might have a life and considerably better things to do with it at the moment. On a personal level, back in 2003 I was much more sceptical about the Guardian anti-Israel thing than I am now, I used to hotly defend it from its detractors and seek only balance within its news pages. Since then my opinion has slowly, and reluctantly, changed. There are little things – the persistence in referring to the Western Wall in Jerusalem as the “Wailing Wall� (the reasons why that is insulting could run to a separate post altogether) – and there are bigger things, the most striking of which for me recently was the illustration of a story on a suicide bombing with a picture of the bomber’s grieving mother. Annoyingly I’m not able to back this latter example up with evidence from the GU archive (which has been frustrating me all week for various reasons) so you’ll have to take my word for it. I suppose the (unsubstantiated) burden of my complaint is that it’s the viewpoint of the Guardian’s news coverage – and it’s only really the news coverage with which I have a problem, opinion is opinion and is presented as such - that upsets me. Your analysis of the content may well hold as true now as it did two years ago, and I suspect it does, but it’s as much about the manner of the presentation as the substance. Clearly this one will run and run, and it’s all just a part of the wider issue of Israel and The Left, which is far more problematic. It’s good that there are voices of sanity that can keep it on the agenda though. I’ll be looking over those attractive bar charts again at a less frantic time… By the way, there’s a very small typo on page 4 of the pdf. Sorry. A considered post, and one which deserves a lengthier and better thought-out response than I’m afraid I’m going to be able to give just now.

Have skim-read your comparative analysis and am impressed - it’s very illuminating and would be interesting to see the a repeat of the exercise for the same period in 2005. However I suspect that you might have a life and considerably better things to do with it at the moment.

On a personal level, back in 2003 I was much more sceptical about the Guardian anti-Israel thing than I am now, I used to hotly defend it from its detractors and seek only balance within its news pages. Since then my opinion has slowly, and reluctantly, changed. There are little things – the persistence in referring to the Western Wall in Jerusalem as the “Wailing Wall� (the reasons why that is insulting could run to a separate post altogether) – and there are bigger things, the most striking of which for me recently was the illustration of a story on a suicide bombing with a picture of the bomber’s grieving mother.

Annoyingly I’m not able to back this latter example up with evidence from the GU archive (which has been frustrating me all week for various reasons) so you’ll have to take my word for it.

I suppose the (unsubstantiated) burden of my complaint is that it’s the viewpoint of the Guardian’s news coverage – and it’s only really the news coverage with which I have a problem, opinion is opinion and is presented as such - that upsets me. Your analysis of the content may well hold as true now as it did two years ago, and I suspect it does, but it’s as much about the manner of the presentation as the substance.

Clearly this one will run and run, and it’s all just a part of the wider issue of Israel and The Left, which is far more problematic. It’s good that there are voices of sanity that can keep it on the agenda though. I’ll be looking over those attractive bar charts again at a less frantic time…

By the way, there’s a very small typo on page 4 of the pdf. Sorry.

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